Strength of Webs with Corner Openings

An equilibrium method of predicting the ultimate capacity of plate girder webs containing corner openings and loaded in shear is presented and is based on the post-critical behaviour of such webs. Tests are presented to confirm that it is advantageous to locate the holes in the corners of webs along the compression diagonals and far away from the tension field. The predicted strengths using the proposed theory are compared with the observed strengths; the correlation based on some eight tests is found to be satisfactory. A convenient procedure for computing the ultimate shear capacity of such webs is suggested.
R. Narayanan and N.G.V. Der Avanessian